


All of Our Scars

by princesitka



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin
Genre: Angst, Canon Universe, Hearing Voices, Implied Character Death, M/M, Ten Years Later, hallucination
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-30
Updated: 2014-06-30
Packaged: 2018-02-06 21:14:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1872684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princesitka/pseuds/princesitka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ten years had not been kind to any of them.<br/>Jean Kirschtein heard voices in his head, Mikasa Ackerman was blind in one eye, and Eren Jaeger was a narrow minded, disciplined monster. </p><p>It also didn't hurt to mention that Levi visits a younger version of Eren on the roof every morning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All of Our Scars

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: sad times beyond this point.

In a world such as there's, ten years is equal to a lifetime. In a regiment such as there's, ten years means that you're practically invincable. 

Ten years can also mean a long time of suffering. 

Ten years ago, Eren Jaeger had been placed in the Survey Corps under Captain Levi Ackerman's watchful gaze, threatened into a willful submission with the promise of a blade in the back of his neck. 

The Eren Jaeger then had been young, determined, and freshly graduated from training, ready to prove his worth to the people who had already placed a death sentence on his person. He had taken on all of the tasks his Captain had thrown at him head on, from cleaning out the horse stables to shining the whole squad's blades, anything to prove he had just as much of a right to be there as any of the other recruits.

Unfortunately, as hard as Eren worked, as many things as he took on, he never truly earned what he wanted the most.

Acceptance from his comrads and the trust of his people.

Meaning to say, the last ten years had not been kind to Eren Jaeger. 

Levi knows this the best, and acknowledges it every day as he sits at the head of the table and drinks his morning tea. 

His table was full again, something he was thankful for. He was also thankful for the constants at his table, but the new faces he saw as well. Although, he couldn't help but forget their names sometimes. Remembering names was beginning to become harder and harder for him. 

To his left sits Mikasa Ackerman, who has become a legend and a rolemodel, much like himself. She sits rigid in her seat, eating her morning breakfast with military-like purpose. Her black hair is pixie short now, but is kept long enough in the bangs that it covers her left eye, which has a scar across it so deep that it has permanently blinded her there. Her beloved red scarf, which had been given to her by her adoptive brother Eren, had been reduced to tatters in the past couple of years. Now she had chosen to have it altered into something like a bandana that tied around her neck, saying that she still wanted to keep the disgusting red fabric with her always.

To his right sits the man he is forced to acknowledge every day, the man who is now twenty six years old.

Every day Levi acknowledges him, he wants to scream at him and ask where he has taken the sixteen year old boy from ten years ago. 

Of course, maybe that means Levi really is a crazy old man, something he is called often by the new recruits. But he doesn't think so, and the pain he feels twisting deep inside him every time he looks at Eren Jaeger tells him otherwise. 

Levi watches from behind his tea cup as Eren Jaeger lifts a forkful of scrambled eggs to his cracked lips, dark eyes closing as he eats. There is a permanent furrow in his brow now, much like Levi's own, but the scars that draw away from his eyes tell of the years of hoping, of trying to prove he could be a helpful aid to humanity's cause. Long, dark hair cascades from his scalp, falling back into a messy ponytail that ends right between his shoulder blades. His hands are bandaged to his elbows, because even though his abilities allow him to heal quickly, he has mutilated himself so many times he has permanently scarred his hands. His body is no longer lean with newly developing muscle, but is thick with years of hard labor, and Levi finds that he is now just as muscular as himself, maybe even more so. 

Eren still wears his brass key, and it always hangs around his thick neck now. Levi remembers when he used to hang it on his bed post at night, and when a group of new recruits had snuck in to his room and stolen it. 

Levi had left their punishment up to Eren as a form of test, to see just how well he could control his anger, because Eren always took his self turmoil out on others.

Without the guidance of his Captain, or any contact with his friends, Eren had ended up choosing to whip them. 

Levi tries to ignore the fact that as he sips his slowly cooling tea, blood drips from Eren's nose and into his eggs. And Eren barely notices, only picking up his napkin to dab at his nostril when Mikasa catches his eye and makes a motion towards her own nose. 

Sitting beside Mikasa is Jean Kirschtein, who is smoking while he drinks his morning coffee, a habit Levi has long since given up discouraging. His eyes are closed as he tries to drown out the chatter from the rest of the table, and possibly the voices in his own mind as well. Levi hears him talking to them in his room sometimes, and he definitely hears when Jean is screaming at them in his sleep. He considers himself lucky his room isn't in the same hall as Jean's.

The rest of the faces at the table are new, replacements that the military has picked out for Levi. He doesn't hand pick his squads anymore, and he figures this way he won't have to get attached to them this way. 

Eren, Mikasa, and Jean lead their own squads, which sit at the table as well, and Levi presides where he always does, watching and waiting at the head of the table until he can clear out of this room and go back to where he does his thinking the best, the roof of the base. 

Jean's eyes flick open when he feels a hand on his shoulder, and a quiet 'Dad' spoken softly from the person who sits next to him.

"What?" Jean grits out, and oh god, Levi thinks, not this again.

"Are you alright?" Jean Kirschtein's son all but whispers, and Levi can see his hand shaking already. 

Jean only grunts and shakes his son's hand free from his shoulder, continueing to smoke and talk to himself like his child had not even spoken to him. But Levi supposes he does not judge Jean for the way he acts towards his son, because that is the only way Jean has learned to stay alive over the years. 

Because his son is in the Survey Corps, and while he is in Mikasa's squad, which has a higher mortality rate than any of the other squads, even Levi's own, he has a death sentence stamped on his forehead. And Jean has loved and lost one too many times to be fooled into attachment now. 

Levi watches as Eren stands on his right, a silent signal that the man's squad should be done within five minutes and out on the training field for morning exercises. Unlike the disorganized and bull headed boy from ten years ago, he is now strict and disiplined, and any kind of fooling around in his squad results in direct and harsh punishment. 

Levi stands as well, but that is not a silent signal to his squad for anything, and they keep on chattering away and enjoying breakfast like long time friends. He follows Eren out of the breakfast hall and takes a right turn towards the stairs that lead to the roof, taking in a heady breath as musty air fills his nostrils. 

He can feel the sunlight warming his skin as he emerges before the clear blue sky, and closes his eyes to revel in it because he knows these stairs by heart, has walked them a hundred times over now.

"Captain." 

His eyes open again, and there on the roof before him is Eren. Not the Eren of now, the one with rippling muscle and dark black eyes, but the one from ten years ago. 

The one Levi knew so well.

He stands there and smiles openly, a sunkissed and unbandaged hand resting on the concrete of the edge of the roof. 

"It's nice to see you again, Captain."

Levi sighs and walks foward, coming to stand beside Eren as he wraps his arms around his waist. 

"It's nice to see you again too, Eren."

Eren's gaze turns toward to expanse of rolling green of the training fields, to where his own squad is slowly filing out of building.

His smile turns sad, and the skin beside his eyes pinches in premature crow's feet. 

He doesn't even have to say anything, because Levi knows what he's thinking. He hears it every day, and it's a grim reminder of his new reality.

"I don't know how much longer I can do this." Levi says, and Eren leans his forehead down on his shoulder, breathing in his scent deeply.

"You have to keep fighting." Eren whispers, his voice just a breath on the wind. "Please keep fighting, Levi." 

Levi sighs and looks off to where Eren paces in front of his squad, making sure they complete their full number of push ups.

"What good is fighting when your own humanity is already lost?" 

Ten years and they had lived to see the lifetimes of too many soldiers come to pass.

Ten years and Levi had lived to see the humanity of those living soldiers fade to the background as they fought to save everyone else's.

Ten years had not been kind to any of them.


End file.
